Borros and Aemond's Political Alliance

Borros Baratheon and Aemond Targaryen’s political alliance was conceived as a marriage bargain that could bring Storm’s End and the Stormlands to Aemond’s brother’s side in the succession struggle. It joined a royal claimant’s need for regional support to Borros’s control of a powerful lordship, but its personal terms remain uncertain: Aemond went to court one of Borros’s daughters, yet no source records which one he selected or confirms that the marriage took place.

Political Setting and Strategic Purpose

The proposed match emerged from competing efforts to secure the great houses before the succession dispute became open war. Queen Alicent Hightower identified Storm’s End as the most dangerous prize for her son’s cause. House Baratheon had long supported the claims of Princess Rhaenys Targaryen and her children, and Borros was considered even more belligerent than his late father, Boremund Baratheon. Alicent therefore sent Aemond to seek a marriage with one of Borros’s daughters, expecting the match to turn the Stormlands toward his brother.

The proposal was a concrete example of the political use of marriage in Westeros. Aegon I’s queens had arranged marriages between distant noble houses in the hope of binding conquered lands together, while the succession conflict now made a daughter’s hand an instrument for securing a region’s allegiance. Unlike those earlier arrangements, however, Aemond’s mission was an urgent negotiation between rival claimants: the intended wedding was to deliver a near-term political commitment, not simply reinforce ties over time.

Aemond’s journey also belonged to a larger contest over support. Alicent’s party had examined the Great Council of 101 and considered which houses might aid Rhaenyra, while other envoys were being sent to secure the realm. Aemond travelled not by raven but on Vhagar, the oldest and largest dragon in Westeros. Otto Hightower made the mission’s terms plain: Aemond was to woo and marry one of Borros’s daughters, and Borros would then bring the Stormlands to his brother. The alliance was thus planned as an exchange of dynastic access for military and political allegiance.

Courtship at Storm’s End

Borros received Aemond with feasts, hunts, and jousting, a warmer reception than the prince had feared. He was willing to entertain the marriage proposal and presented his four daughters as possible brides. He described Cass as the eldest and likely to mature first, Floris as the prettiest, and Maris as the clever one. The sources do not identify the fourth daughter by name in this exchange, nor do they establish which of the four Aemond ultimately preferred.

The negotiations were sufficiently advanced that, according to one account, Aemond and Borros were discussing dates and dowries on the morning Lucerys Velaryon arrived. This detail makes the proposed alliance more than a general expression of sympathy: it had reached the practical stage of bargaining over the terms of a possible marriage. Yet it remained contingent. The text does not report a completed betrothal, wedding, or formal pledge by Borros before the encounter with Rhaenyra’s envoy.

Borros explained his political position to Aemond by contrasting his father’s support for Rhaenys with his own view of succession. He acknowledged the kinship between their houses, but argued that Rhaenyra was not Rhaenys and questioned why the Iron Throne should follow a different rule from Storm’s End. He said that if he had a son, the lordship would pass to that son rather than his daughters. His argument made the marriage offer inseparable from his view of inheritance: a royal match could benefit his daughters, but it would not persuade him to set aside the male-preference principle he applied to his own house.

Rhaenyra’s Envoy and the Limits of the Bargain

The arrival of Lucerys exposed the alliance’s immediate stakes. Rhaenyra had sent him to Storm’s End as an envoy, carrying her appeal for Borros’s support. Borros had already received Aemond, and Lucerys’s presence placed competing royal claims and competing requests for allegiance in the same hall. Borros had his maester read Rhaenyra’s letter aloud to him; he then asked Lucerys which of his daughters he would marry if Borros did as the queen requested.

Lucerys answered that he was not free to marry because he was betrothed to his cousin, Rhaena Targaryen. The exchange showed the asymmetry between the two missions. Aemond had been sent with an offer designed to secure a marriage and thereby win Storm’s End; Lucerys could not counter with a comparable match. Borros rejected Rhaenyra’s appeal and told Lucerys to return to his mother. His response closed the door on her attempt to gain his support, while reinforcing the prospect that the Baratheons would favor Aemond’s side.

Borros nevertheless distinguished between his political decision and violence under his roof. When Aemond threatened Lucerys, Borros objected that Lucerys had come as an envoy and ordered that no blood be shed inside the castle. His guards separated the princes and escorted Lucerys from the Round Hall. This protection was limited to the castle’s interior: when Aemond asked leave to pursue Lucerys outside, Borros did not forbid him, and his knights moved aside.

Alliance, Uncertainty, and Consequences

The political bargain never receives a fully documented conclusion. The narrative states that Aemond and Borros were negotiating dates and dowries, but preserves no record of Aemond’s final choice among the daughters; one account specifically says that he did not choose Maris. Nor does the evidence confirm that any daughter married him. The safest description is therefore a proposed and actively negotiated alliance, rather than a recorded marriage. Its political direction is clear, but its formal completion is not.

The encounter also showed that Borros’s support was not simply a matter of inherited loyalty or family connection. Although House Baratheon had supported Rhaenys and her children, Borros questioned whether that history bound him to Rhaenyra. He treated the offer of marriage as a means of choosing between rival causes and insisted that the claimant’s request be backed by a benefit to his house. His readiness to entertain Aemond’s suit, alongside his rejection of Lucerys’s appeal, made Storm’s End a decisive political prize.

The alliance’s most immediate consequence was the confrontation that followed. After Borros’s guards escorted Lucerys outside, Aemond pursued him, and the two princes met above Shipbreaker Bay in a storm. Lucerys and his dragon did not survive. The text does not say that a marriage between Aemond and a Baratheon daughter had been completed before this fatal pursuit; instead, it places the negotiation and the violence side by side. The proposed union had helped bring Aemond to Storm’s End, while Borros’s refusal to restrain him beyond the castle walls allowed the diplomatic encounter to end in catastrophe.